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On a chilly night in February, Jess* stands outside an ordinary white door in Camden, waiting for her companion to press the bell.

He gives an innocuous-sounding password, and is rewarded with a buzz as the door unlocks.

They climb narrow flights of stairs and enter a sparsely furnished flat, with an open-plan living room where porn is playing on a television screen and the coffee table is accessories only with a box of tissues.

This is one of London’s underground sex clubs, a secret part of the capital’s sex scene that falls somewhere between swingers clubs and brothels. These venues are essentially private residences where once you’ve paid your entrance fee, you can pretty much do as you like.

They might bill themselves online as an experience for couples, but they are staffed by sex workers and filled with men who come to use their services.

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Le Boudoir and Killing Kittens they are not.

Makeshift sex clubs don’t have alcohol licences, so you have to bring your own bottle and have it doled out to you throughout your visit.

In some, the fee you pay as a couple on the door, often around £30, will be refunded to you if the female partner allows other men in the venue to touch her.

For a single man the fee will be about £70 for which he gets as much sex as he can manage.

Jess and her friend hand over their coats and bags to the smiling host and empty their pockets of phones, keys and coins. They venture further upstairs, glasses of wine from the bottle they’d brought in hand, and that’s when Jess starts to feel nervous.

‘I was quite drunk already but my heart was pounding,’ she tells Metro.co.uk. ‘It was my first time trying anything like this. I was worried that I’d look completely out of place or freeze up and not want to do anything when the time came.’

They peep into several rooms, where women lie on beds servicing men, while others queue, watching and masturbating.

(Picture: Ella Byworth for Metro.co.uk)

Jess says: ‘Some men were naked, some had towels on and some were half-dressed. The women were definitely sex workers and there to work rather than to have fun. They each had a bed they didn’t move from and a queue of men waiting their turns for sex.

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‘It made me feel scared that there weren’t any other couples there because all the focus was immediately on me. I only wanted to be touched by my partner but lots and lots of men asked if they could get involved.

‘We said no and they grouped around us, stroking their cocks, while we played with each other. After a while, it got so crowded in the room we were in that the bouncer from downstairs came up to make sure that no one was doing anything we didn’t want them to do.

‘I felt safer with him there, but then I noticed he was w*nking too.’

Jason* works in the City and is in his late 50s.

He told Metro.co.uk: ‘I’ve been to one of these clubs a few times on my own and twice with a partner. They always pretend to be swingers’ clubs but they aren’t, they just have a number of sex workers there.

‘They’re advertised online, and if you sign up you get texts which ALWAYS mention couples being there. The women are open about being sex workers – some will even say “I’m on my break now”. It’s not a secret, and all the men will say “she works here”.

‘They give the men towels to put on once they’ve taken their clothes off although I keep my clothes on. The venue has maybe three bedrooms. It’s all open so you can just wander around watching people having sex which is why I’ve been because I’m voyeuristic and like to watch.’

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‘Everyone gets excited if a real couple turn up.

‘When I went with a partner a lot of men stood around w*nking while she sucked me and I fingered her. You get constant requests as to whether others can join in, but you just say no.

‘I once saw a genuine couple and the woman was taken by about ten men, one after another. It may seem wrong but it was amazingly hot.

‘The whole atmosphere is seedy, strange but exciting. I always think afterwards I won’t go again – but then I do.’

(Picture: Ella Byworth for Metro.co.uk)

Jason said that he prefers to watch real couples in more traditional swingers clubs but underground venues are open more often. Rather than having to wait for a Friday or Saturday to attend, he can go back any night of the week.

‘The men going know they are there to have sex with sex workers, if they have sex with an ordinary couple then that’s a huge bonus but it’s a given that the sex is with women paid by the club.’

When asked if he knew how much the sex workers were paid, Jason said: ‘I dont know how much they are paid – no sex worker at such a place would say and the organisers certainly won’t.’

Owning or managing a brothel is currently illegal under UK law, although there are calls from sex workers to decriminalise them in the interest of sex workers’ safety, as working from a residence with others affords far more security than working alone or on the street.

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Worryingly though, both Jess and Jason confirm that once guests had paid their entrance fee, male guests seemed to be able to stick around to have relations with the sex workers available as many times as they wanted, unlike in a traditional brothel setting where you pay a set amount to do agreed upon acts with one sex worker.

These clubs take sex work out of the traditional model into one of multiple sexual encounters with no apparent extra benefits for the sex workers involved. It doesn’t matter if they have sex with one client or a dozen, their payment is the same. And it might not be much.

Although underground venues might be more the preserve of sex workers and lone men than couples, if you’re a woman looking to be watched, you’re guaranteed to get plenty of attention.

Jess describes the experience as helping her understand that she’s actually a bit of an exhibitionist.

‘I always thought I’d be quite shy in that situation, but I really enjoyed the fact that so many men were watching me and getting off on what I was doing with my partner.